Three Jehovah’s Witnesses* from Novocherkassk sentenced to imprisonment

A court sentenced Garegin Khachaturyan, Gevorg Yeritsyan, and Lyubov Galitsyna, Jehovah’s Witnesses* from Novocherkassk, to various terms of imprisonment, finding them guilty of extremism.

The “Caucasian Knot” has reported that in September 2023, in Novocherkassk, a court closed the trial in the case against Garegin Khachaturyan, Gevorg Yeritsyan, and Lyubov Galitsyna, accused of extremism. In December of the same year, pensioner Lyubov Galitsyna, who spent a year and four months in a SIZO (pre-trial prison), was transferred to house arrest.

Garegin Khachaturyan was sentenced to six years and six months, Gevorg Yeritsyan – to six years and two months, and 68-year-old Lyubov Galitsyna – to two years and three months of imprisonment in a penal colony, the “OVD-Info”** human rights project reports. At the same time, the court considered the Lyubov Galitsyna’s sentence had already been served and she would stay free.

In the SIZO, the health state of Lyubov Galitsyna worsened: she was diagnosed with diabetes and hypertension. The woman also got hearing and vision problems. In February, Lyubov Galitsyna was denied a medical examination with explanation that her illnesses did not prevent her imprisonment.

According to the investigators’ version, Lyubov Galitsyna participated in religious meetings and involved people as new members of a religious association; Garegin Khachaturyan and Gevorg Yeritsyan committed the same actions, but they were also organizers of the religious organization.

*396 Russian organizations of Jehovah's Witnesses are recognized as extremist, and their activities in Russia are banned by court’s decision.

**Included by the Russian Ministry of Justice (MoJ) into the register of foreign agents.